T’was the year of Our Lord fifteen hundred and fifty-something-ish. The grand empire of Great Britain encompassed all of the British Isles and a wide swath of coastal mainland provinces north of France. To the east, Burgundy had recently succumbed to the newly formed Netherlands, which had consolidated around the trade center in Antwerp, and was marshalling its forces against the monstrous Denmark that had annexed the now former countries of Norway and Sweden. And finally, to the west, the four isolated provinces of Brittany across the English Channel. This was the most tantalizing of targets with few forces and only Portugal as an ally of note. The crown coveted her lands.

Everything had fallen in place for a powerful English Empire to permanently secure its presence as a continental European power and marginalize the hated French into an ever smaller box between His Royal Majesty’s Army, Spain, the HRE (Holy Roman Empire) and the ocean. As long as the civilized world didn’t rise up as one against the English conquest of the province of Armor, it seemed like a foolproof plan.

Which, as it turned out, was the moment in my fourth game of Europa Universalis IV where the world did, in fact, rise up as one against my invasion.